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A federal proposal to lease the dry bed of Sevier Lake in Utah's west desert to mining companies has some fearing for the effects on migratory birds and on the Wasatch Front's air.
The Bureau of Land Management's Fillmore office issued an environmental assessment last month supporting the lease of 126,000 acres of the Millard County lake bed for potash mining by construction of evaporative ponds and use of groundwater in them.
The Audubon Society wrote a letter to the BLM last week asking its state office to reject the proposal or scale it back.
"The proposed action has the potential for serious and extensive environmental impacts," Audubon Council of Utah policy advocate Steve Erickson wrote to the agency's Fillmore office.
BLM officials in Fillmore did not respond to requests for an interview.
Audubon's fears center on the lake's occasional importance as a feeding ground for migratory shorebirds in the interior West and on the potential dangers of attracting birds to contaminated pools. Sevier Lake comes to life in high-water periods and was Utah's third-largest lake during the wet period of the 1980s, when rising levels pushed some Great Salt Lake feeding marshes out of reach of the birds that normally use them.
Brine shrimp and fly larvae lie dormant in Sevier Lake's crust, according to the BLM assessment, awaiting the next flood. Shorebirds eat those creatures as fuel for their flights to nesting or wintering grounds. The Audubon letter says Sevier Lake can serve as a major resource for birds in the future, although the BLM did not study whether mining would cut off the fly and shrimp supply or whether pumping and evaporating groundwater from the basin might leave the lake unable to re-emerge in a wet period.
"It's something that's just lying there, waiting to be used [by birds]," said Wayne Martinson, Audubon's coordinator for important bird areas in Utah. Sevier Lake becomes important to birds when Great Salt Lake wetlands are covered or other areas aren't available to the migrant grebes, avocets and others. "This is like a safety valve."
Audubon members also complain that disruption of the lake bed could cause dust pollution that would foul the Wasatch Front's air. The BLM study calls for dust control, including constant watering during mine operations, but the group says that doesn't cover potential dust after mining ceases.
Millard County Commissioner Bart Whatcott said the county is watching the proposal closely to ensure it doesn't hurt nearby agricultural water users.
"We're concerned about it," he said. "Water is a pretty precious commodity on the west desert, and we watch those kinds of applications pretty close. But there's nothing right now that raises a red flag that says we ought to jump in with both feet [in opposition]."
Full development of the mining leases would require 120,000 acre-feet of water for about seven years. (An acre-foot is enough to supply up to two households for a year.)
The leases would be issued to competitive bidders, and the BLM assessment notes that it's legally too big to lease to a single company.
The Audubon Society's letter questions the economic need to lease the lake bed at all when only one company, Salt Lake City's Emerald Peak Minerals, has inquired with the state about water rights.
Emerald Peak Minerals did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment on Monday.